Following the martyrdom of General Ali Shadmani, commander of the Khatam al-Anbiya Headquarters, and the wide media circulation of his daughter’s account, discussions around Israel’s intelligence infiltration into the country have entered a new phase. When some officials refer only to tools such as WhatsApp or to migrants and citizens of neighboring countries as the main infiltration agents, they reduce a strategic threat to a manageable tactical level. However, the reality of the intelligence battlefield tells another story.
Mahdieh Shadmani, in a painfully candid post reacting to the head of passive defense’s remarks, wrote: “My father did not have a mobile phone. Security protocols were followed. Yet Israel targeted him multiple times.” This sentence should be analyzed as an eyewitness testament to the shift in intelligence-gathering and targeting methods. Today’s intelligence battles go far beyond phone tapping, tracking, or face-to-face infiltration; they are hybrid wars of data, satellites, artificial intelligence, and the cooperation of multiple intelligence agencies.
Israel’s Intelligence Alliance with the Western Bloc
Israel has extensive experience in precise, targeted intelligence operations. Some of the most notable examples include:
The assassination of Imad Mughniyeh (2008): The Hezbollah military commander was killed by a precise bomb planted in his car seat, remotely detonated in a highly secured neighborhood of Damascus. It was later revealed that this operation was carried out with direct cooperation between the CIA and Mossad.
The cyberattack on Natanz facilities (2010): The infamous Stuxnet malware, the world’s first known cyber weapon, was designed to sabotage Iran’s centrifuges. Multiple reports indicate it was developed and deployed through cooperation between the NSA (National Security Agency) and Israel’s Unit 8200.
The assassination of Mohsen Fakhrizadeh (2020): A complex operation that simultaneously used a remote-controlled robot, facial recognition technology, and urban traffic data. Although Israel did not officially claim responsibility, global intelligence analysts considered it a result of ultra-advanced technological capability and Western-Israeli inter-agency teamwork.
Precision targeting in Gaza and Lebanon: Israel has repeatedly targeted Hamas, Islamic Jihad, or Hezbollah commanders in specific buildings at exact times. According to Western sources, this precision results from the simultaneous use of digital surveillance, satellite imagery, human intelligence, and even behavioral analytics.
Contrary to popular belief, Israel does not act alone in these operations. Its cooperation with the NSA, CIA, Britain’s GCHQ, Germany’s BND, and even France’s intelligence services has been documented for decades. A clear example was the program exposed by Edward Snowden, revealing that the NSA collected data from millions of internet users and global calls, sharing parts of it with key partners including Israel. Additionally, under the Five Eyes project, filtered and analyzed surveillance data from American platforms (Google, Facebook, WhatsApp, etc.) is provided to select governments, including Israel.
Therefore, when people speak of the role of an app or foreign nationals, it must be understood that these are merely the visible surface of the threat; its core lies within extensive, global, inter-agency intelligence cooperation across the Western world.
Strategic Warning: Oversimplifying the Threat is a Threat in Itself
Today’s intelligence war is an asymmetric and complex battle in which the enemy targets not only our weapons but also our very thinking structures. If the country’s intelligence system, instead of developing indigenous technologies, defensive AI, independent encryption networks, and education-based institutions, continues to merely block WhatsApp and track defenseless Afghan migrants, it will inevitably face future surprises.
Reducing the threat to WhatsApp or Afghan refugees may be comforting in the short term, but in the long run, it leads to strategic negligence. We face an enemy that devises plans in dark intelligence rooms, leaving traces not on phones or borders, but hidden within data, the cloud, algorithms, and behavioral analysis.
It is essential to replace diversionary enemy-making with precise, scientific enemy-recognition, to restructure passive defense, and to train a new generation of intelligence analysts. Otherwise, as the martyr’s daughter said, we will continue to see “defenseless bodies” returning from the battlefield, having been left without informational weapons. In wartime conditions, oversimplifying the threat can itself become an added threat.
Indeed, WhatsApp is insecure, unregulated migration carries risks, and individual negligence can be disastrous. However, alongside these, strategic analysis of the enemy’s technological level, new reconnaissance tools, and Israel’s hybrid warfare doctrine must become priorities.
As Mahdieh Shadmani bitterly said: “Israel’s tracking goes beyond WhatsApp.” This sentence, instead of being dismissed or denied, should become the basis for a new, vigilant analysis within our intelligence and security institutions. Today’s infiltration may not come through a single door, but through a thousand cracks—and to counter it, we must open a thousand eyes.
NOURNEWS